


Under the Moons of Darillium: Part 2 Attack of the Memory Worms

by Stardance1



Series: Under the Moons of Darillium: A Night of Adventures [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio), The Diary of River Song (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Multi, Post-Episode: 2015 Xmas The Husbands of River Song, Singing Towers of Darillium
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-12
Updated: 2018-09-12
Packaged: 2019-07-11 12:28:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15972329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stardance1/pseuds/Stardance1
Summary: River has promised the Doctor a safe adventure on Darillium. Can she deliver? Or, will she need to save the day?





	Under the Moons of Darillium: Part 2 Attack of the Memory Worms

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that this is Part 2 of a Series.

The soft familiar hum of the Tardis engines whirling and whooshing lulled its two occupants deeper into their sleep.  
River had started dreaming. She found herself walking on the soft hills of a red planet, tall grasses and medium trees dotted the dusty landscape, and the golden light was welcoming. It reminded her of the autumnal hues of the earth, and yet it was different. The planet seemed to call to her, to have her name on its lips. She smiled in her sleep and wished the Doctor could see it with her.  
Suddenly, he materialized next to her, holding her hand, daring her to run with him up a bronze hill. They fell laughing and exhausted at the base of a tall maroon tree, its branches curved like the spiral arms of a galaxy. Even though it was daylight, the moons were visible in the sky, and their light peeked through the leaves like diamonds or stars, sparkling in the sun. He kissed her, lowering her down into the bright red grasses which shone like fire in the sunlight. He pulled open her shirt and nuzzled her breast, grazing her nipple with his teeth.  
In their bed, River moaned, her head tossing slightly in her sleep. She called out the Doctor’s name in her mind, accidentally opening her mental telepathy. In her dream River reached out for the Doctor, pulling him closer, and yet like a cloud of smoke, the colors of the foreign land swirled away, and River opened her eyes.  
The Doctor was staring back at her, evidently wide awake.  
“Did.. I moan and wake you?” River asked the Doctor sheepishly, yawning and rubbing one eye with the back of her hand.  
“Yes,” he replied, a bit crossly, “but it was the shouting of my name in my mind that actually woke me.”  
“Oops?” River responded with half a laugh.  
“River, this is almost as bad as the time you summoned me to your rescue from a peril worse than death, and you were just at a faculty dinner at Luna U!”  
Now River did laugh, “Doctor, have you ever attended faculty functions at a University? I promise you it is far worse than death, and you…. were my savior!” She had half hoisted herself above him, and was now leaning over to plant tantalizing kisses on his neck.  
As her attentions began to trail lower, the Doctor interrupted….  
“So what were you dreaming about Professor Song, that stirred us both from our sleep?”  
“Well Doctor, a 24 year night I think implies quite a bit of nocturnal activity, wouldn’t you agree…” with a cocked eyebrow, River cast her wicked gaze down the Doctor’s long frame, “No need to say anything at all my love… I can already see that you’re quite happy to see me!”  
Fully awake and erect, the Doctor now moaned in defeat and surrender. Grabbing hold of her arms he rolled her over onto her pillow, corkscrew curls framing her beloved face like a halo. He couldn’t help it, he smiled as he kissed the corner of her mouth. River turned her face slightly and met his lips fully with her own.  
_____________ 

Quite a bit of time later, when the Doctor had left to bathe, River lay naked on their bed, her Darillium diary open as she jotted down her thoughts.  
The Doctor walked in, dressed in a velvety black suit with red lining, combing his fingers through his wet hair.  
“Hello Sweetie,” River gazed up at his tall frame, approvingly, "I love me that coat Doctor.”  
"Yes, I rather thought you would," he replied, nonchalantly, his eyes betraying the twinkle of appreciation, "I was thinking of you when I purchased it.”  
“Were you really?” River said smiling  
The Doctor shrugged, a secret grin on his lips.  
“What plans do we have Doctor?” River asked. The Doctor sat on the bed, “We have my list of things to do…” she reminded him, tapping on the pages of her Diary impatiently with her pen. The Doctor had wanted to lay low for some time after their last adventure, she understood, but it was time to get back in the saddle.  
“Actually,” the Doctor began, "I’d like to write you some more songs first.”  
He picked up his electric guitar and pressing his wah pedal, riffed a long haunting, vibrating chord that seemed to reverberate in River’s hearts and set the pit of her stomach aglow.  
"Are you… being serious?" River asked in almost a whisper, trying to reign in how much like a crazed teenage fan her new rock and roll husband was making her feel.  
Of course the Doctor simply shrugged again, as he gazed at her, knowing too well how hot and bothered she’d be.  
And then River did something she rarely if ever did, and would certainly never admit to, she felt a deep flush spread across her chest and rise to her cheeks.  
"Some of them have been hits already"…. the Doctor continued….  
“Really…?” she said suddenly clutching her closed Diary to her chest…  
"Of course,… Leonard Cohen’s Take This Waltz (he fancied me a bit), Kip Moore’s Lead Me, and don’t forget Van Morrison’s Crazy Love … I was thinking of you when I wrote them….I even mentioned you by name whenever I could…there are others of course, popular on other planets too … River, are you possibly.. blushing?” He ogled her flushed breasts with a wide grin.  
“Doctor," River stammered, "I’m …” she searched for a word, "flattered."  
"Really River?" He teased, "there’s plenty more where that came from.”  
And with that he went back to strumming on his guitar.  
Oh you she thought, shaking her curls slightly. Her husband with the swappable bodies and faces, always hers and yet always surprising too. She smiled and listened to his music, as she went back to writing in her Diary. When she was done, she grabbed some clothes off of the floor and went off to make their breakfast. She left the door to their bedroom open so she could hear the music and the soft phrases he’d sing and hum.  
In the kitchen she made the last of the eggs, mentally making a shopping list for tomorrow, and simultaneously scheming on how to get the Doctor to play the songs he’d written for her, later... while naked in bed. And if possible, she smiled even more, absurdly pleased with her plan.  
———  
They sat opposite each other at a little breakfast bar on the Tardis, overlooking the main console room.  
She was loathe to push it and upset him, but they both needed to get out.  
She’d manage delicately, without having him fall into those panics his temper predisposed him to. But no matter what she tried, he seemed particularly uneasy at times about Darillium.  
"We have to go shopping Doctor", River said gently, looking up at him innocently and batting her long eyelashes. "We’re out of food and it might be a good time to explore the markets…”  
He met her eyes, slightly narrowing his own discerningly, ultimately absolutely sure of her true intentions.  
“I thought we could have lunch at Chez Alphonse.” the Doctor said. “Alphonse had asked me to look in on him and some trouble he was having, I’m sure they’d be happy to sell us supplies from the kitchen…”  
“Doctor!” River said a little too impatiently, “Let’s go explore, I know you want to…”  
The problem was that he did want to. Both he and River were too much alike, too headstrong, too adventurous. But she was too darn clever for her own good, and maybe he was too, and neither really clever enough to just stay back and lay low for very long.  
River astutely read the crack in his composure. He was relenting she knew. Quickly she composed her scheme… “Doctor, why don’t we take Nardole and explore some of the early cave dwellings we passed the other day… We could walk there from here and he could join us. I’ll make scholarly notes, he’ll be my assistant and you my partner, and it will be perfectly safe.”  
“Nothing is perfectly safe!” he responded feigning outrage… and then his lips twitched… “Ramone’s head has to stay at the restaurant.”  
“Oh absolutely Doctor.” River agreed, her eyes never leaving his but all the while typing on her handheld computer, "just texting Nardole now…. He’s already on his way, with a picnic lunch to boot!”  
The Doctor sighed fully thwarted, knowing he’d lost this battle but still mostly pleased at the outcome.  
He looked up sternly at River. "Make sure to dress warmly,” he said.  
“Oh absolutely!” she said happily, cleaning off her plate, blowing him a kiss, and hurriedly jumping up to get dressed.  
____________________  
The Doctor went out to greet Nardole, who, having flown in, had just landed outside the Tardis, in King Hydroflax’s metal body.  
“I thought you didn’t like heights?” the Doctor asked as the whipped-up sand began to settle around them.  
“We have to do what we must, Doctor,” Nardole said, “ I am quite getting used to it, and I wouldn’t want your missus to be upset if I were late.”  
“Quite right too!” responded River with a smirk as she exited the Tardis. She was wearing her white puffer coat, dark trousers, and high brown boots. She was armed with her own sonic screwdriver, a gift from the Doctor, and her new Diary, set to take notes.  
She flashed the Doctor a smile.  
He looked her over trying not to linger on how ravishingly lovely she always looked to him.  
"Take your fur vest too River," the Doctor said turning away slightly, " it’s getting cold outdoors and the cave will be even cooler.” A tiny bit crestfallen at the reprimand, but knowing it was just his nerves, River obliged. And when she was ready, the three of them set off through the ever darkening night and walked into the deep sands of Darillium.  
____________________  
About a twenty minute trek later, the Doctor and River were chatting happily about ancient societies, with Nardole following close behind. At the top of a steep sand dune, with its precipice nestled into the side of a mountain, River saw a crack in the rock about 10 feet off the ground.  
“Look Doctor… a crevice in the side of the mountain… it looks like a fracture cave.” River said, looking up to the cave.  
It looked more like a gaping wound in the side of the mountain, the Doctor thought, an unnatural opening with a deep seeded glow.  
“I don’t think that would have been habitable to ancient Darillium societies River,” the Doctor said, “I think it would have been covered by ancient glaciers.” He took her hand as though to gently dissuade her away from the cave.  
“Then, there is no reason not to take a peek.” River reasoned, pulling her hand free, winking at the Doctor and reaching up to climb the side of the mountain.  
River pulled herself up and into the cave’s opening, with the Doctor not far behind. She switched on a torch and walked slowly into the long cavern.  
In the steamy darkness the walls almost pulsated with breath. The mountain seemed to be deteriorating from within, dissolving from thin air, into thin air. Inside the cave, long slivers of stone cascaded from the ceiling, like thick streams of melting candle wax, dripping down and seeping into the floor.  
The height of the cave was astounding, and River, now joined by the Doctor, looked up with her torch but could not seem to get the light to reach the highest point.  
“Have you ever seen anything like it Doctor?” River asked breathlessly…. “For stone, to act like that…"  
“It almost looks like caves where sulfuric acid has eaten away the limestone, creating these types of formations,” the Doctor replied a bit perplexed.  
River shook her head, analyzing the rock with her computer. “But Doctor, this isn’t limestone, and I don’t find any type of naturally occurring acid on these rocks.”  
The Doctor was crouched down on the floor, scanning the area with his sonic screwdriver.  
“Some of the formations are slightly different as well Doctor,” River said, walking in toward the back of the cave.  
“Doctor Song, shall I wait below?” Nardole asked in terror, his voice high and trembling. He had uneasily entered the cave and was now watching the Doctors work.  
“Hush now,” River said brusquely, Nardole was forever terrified of his own shadow. He was a good assistant but she wouldn’t be distracted now.  
She walked further back toward some formations that hung like long thick ropes, their patterns seeming almost segmented. With one hand on her torch River walked toward them, extending her other hand out, planning to brush them aside like the vines of a jungle and make her way back further into the cave.  
“Doctor, do be careful,” River called out, "everything seems coated in slippery muck, you don’t want to fall."  
"River, no wait!” the Doctor shouted…  
Faster than lightning, he had reached her and pulled her back forcefully, in the process spinning her, twisting her ankle around, and loosing his own footing in the process.  
The Doctor fell backward into a dark pit that had been unseen to both of them.  
“Doctor!” River screamed out, calling him urgently, “are you alright?”  
River attempted to shine down her torchlight into the pit, but the wide hole seemed to swallow and absorb her light, like the density black hole.  
“Doctor?” River called again, but only heard a faint, unintelligible response back.  
“Nardole!” River screamed, “come and help me immediately, shine a light down into this pit!”  
“Um,…yes, Professor!” Nardole responded, and then he scurried forward.  
River shook her head, how someone could scurry in a 10 foot metal body she could not understand.  
She sighed.  
But that amused frustration turned into a shriek of terror when she saw what Nardole’s light exposed.  
No wonder the Doctor had landed without a thud! The bottom of the pit was a den of soft, and slithering bodies. The Doctor seemed to be unconscious and sinking fast into the soft waves of some type of ... snakes?  
A hibernaculum, thought River with alarm.  
Suddenly the glint of metal by her feet caught her eye and she realized that the Doctor had dropped his Sonic on his way down.  
She picked it up and listened intently to its analysis.  
Her breath caught.  
The Doctor was surrounded, sinking into a pit of some gigantic form of Darillium Memory Worm!  
River had had some limited past dealings with these types of creatures, she knew that just touching the slime of one could impact the victim's short term memory.  
She shuddered to think what long term exposure could do. Or in fact, what being submerged into a nest of creatures could do.  
She turned to Nardole, simultaneously pleading and ordering with her eyes, her voice strained.  
“Nardole! Please!,” River screamed, “We have to get the Doctor out immediately, and back to the Tardis…. I need your help,” she placed her hand on his metallic arm, “I need you to fly down and extract him”.  
Nardole made a sound like a puppy whining, but his wings popped open from his sides and he gently pushed off and hovered down into the pit.  
With long pinching fingers he grabbed the Doctor by an exposed shoulder, the Doctor’s clothes slowly being disintegrated from the veritable pool of Memory Worm excretions.  
River took one look at the Doctor, as he was being limply dangled from one shoulder, and she shuddered in fear.  
“Take us back to the Tardis, Nardole!” River whispered loudly.  
“But Doctor Song, how can I carry you both?” Nardole asked as he cradled the Doctor into both arms for safety.  
“Never mind! We haven’t the time!” River exclaimed. She climbed onto Nardole’s back and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Go, now!”  
“Yes, Doctor Song!” he responded, and at once flew out of the cave and toward the Tardis.  
Once having landed, River turned to Nardole, "I have to get the Doctor to the generator room, help me, the mucous he is covered in won’t penetrate your metallic shell, and if I touch him now I risk not being able to save him because my own mind will have been impacted.” Nardole nodded and followed River as she ran through the Tardis, leading them where they needed to go.  
“Extractor fans ON,” River shouted in the Tardis, and immediately a strong whoosh of wind passed through. River couldn’t be too careful if the fumes could potentially impact her or even Nardole.  
The Doctor was coated in the slime, it lay thick and heavy on his skin, eating away his past, their past.  
“Doctor?” River whispered to him when they arrived in the generator room, but she received no response.  
River grabbed a fire extinguisher from the wall and attempted to neutralize the slime by spraying the Doctor heavily from head to foot.  
Then she yanked out a massive cable from the Artron Energy Capacitor which the Tardis used to absorb artron energy every time she passed through the time vortex. And a surge of that here could restore the Doctor's memory and help him recover from this trauma.  
She had to try.  
“Nardole, wait outside, I need to create a surge in this room, to reactivate and restore the synapses in the Doctor’s brain, but while it will help restore his memory... it could kill you.” … or kill us both as well, she thought grimly…  
She shook her head pushing those doubts away.  
Nardole stepped outside the room quietly and shut the door behind him. River pulled and rejoined cables, wiring them into the Doctor with a shudder.  
She knelt before him reverently, bowing her head in prayer. “Please let this work!” River whispered to the Tardis. She reached out her hand toward the psychic telepathic circuits on the generator console and shouted to the Tardis, “NOW!”  
An electric shock coursed through the Doctor and then toward River. Sparks flew every which way, and suddenly she could feel his past coursing through, see his beloved faces flash in her mind as they ran through time and space.  
So many timelines woven across millennia! And yet though time was constantly being crumbled, resurrected, and rewritten all around them, every day, like the rising sun, no matter in which reality the Doctor and River found themselves, they seemed to be a constant.  
The Tardis slowly powered down, having delivered all she could to the Doctor.  
River wasn’t sure what she should have expected, but there didn’t seem to be much of a change visible in the Doctor.  
“No!" she whispered harshly, "oh God no…”  
Could this be the reason all of those stories claimed Darillium was their last night together? She knew the Doctor didn’t die here, but could he possibly be erased? Could he have forgotten her, or worse, forgotten himself? Could he have known this would happen? She shook her head, her eyes stinging from unshed tears. She could not panic now and yet all of those times she told herself that she was ready to die, that she didn’t fear his death or hers, came back to mock her. She was not prepared to face this.  
Then the resolve that she was born with, and then genetically had enhanced in her, kicked in. Not on her watch she thought, there is no way she wouldn’t fight tooth and nail to get him back. If this didn’t work, she’d think of something else. She had to.  
Before the Tardis fully powered down, it whirled a message to River.  
River gasped and paled further.  
“Nardole! Help me take the Doctor from here.” River called out.  
Nardole peeked his head in and he grimaced when he saw River’s pained expression.  
“The Doctor was especially susceptible to this because someone has wiped something from his mind, something I also do not know and can’t help fill in. They’ve unravelled years of his time and memory, and it’s at those frays that the Memory Worms attacked….. Nardole, I swear it wasn’t me, my lipsticks and teas, they don't play with his mind, they just conceal his memory of me at certain early points slightly below his subconscious."  
Nardole knew River would never knowingly jeopardize the Doctor. He picked up the Doctor’s pliant body and made his way back toward the bedroom.  
________________________  
Once Nardole placed the Doctor on the bed, he quietly exited without saying anything further to River. He didn’t want to upset her more than she was right now. Both the Doctor and River’s pallor were ashen.  
River slowly undressed the Doctor. He lay, breathing steadily, but not particularly conscious or alert. Occasionally he’d whisper her name, but no more.  
"I’m here my love," she’d whisper back.  
She’d whisper his name in his mind as well, coaxing him back to her, her voice like a trail of breadcrumbs to the world.  
She stripped off her own clothes and climbed into bed with him. River placed her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arms around him for warmth, and ironically, for security.  
She hadn’t realized she was so cold. As though her blood had frozen in her veins. She clung to him.  
It was so quiet thought River, still trying to keep her fear at bay.  
River was so used to the sounds of the time vortex, the exhalation of the Tardis engines, the wheezing of the parking breaks, the rattling of metal, even the whoosh of the Darillium desert wind as it rolled down the dune valleys toward the Tardis.  
But now nothing.  
Even Doctor’s breath was too even and soft, she was used to his hearts beating wildly when he was near her. But she couldn’t hear anything anymore. As though the whole Universe had gone quiet.  
Her entire body trembled from the fear and the cold... and the loneliness.  
She placed her hand on his jaw and spoke to him, trying desperately to get through to him.  
"You are a good man, Doctor. The best man I have ever known; across all of time and space.  
Don’t you forget that Doctor! Don’t let them take that away from you.  
I KNOW Doctor. Can you hear me? Trust me.  
I’m River, I KNOW."  
She had done everything that she could. Now she just had to wait.  
She moved her head onto his chest so that she could fill her ears and thoughts with the rhythm of his hearts.  
Thump thump, thump thump.  
A tear escaped her eye and rolled across his chest. She watched it roll off of him, onto the bed, propelled by the soft rise and fall as he breathed.  
River was asleep when the Doctor’s body finally began to stir. He had rolled onto his side and was spooning a sleeping River. River heard the change in his heart beat first.  
Thump thump, thump thump. Thump thump, thump thump.  
Her eyes opened but the Doctor still seemed caught halfway between a dream world and reality.  
"Shhhh Sweetie, everything is fine," she said snuggling deeper into his arms and trying to coax him back to sleep.  
But then, she could feel the alertness of his body rising. His arms, which had been wrapped around her, were tightening protectively. The hardening of his length behind her was unmistakable and it began to quicken her breath. His body seemed to be reaching for her, and her body was answering instinctively.  
The Doctor called her name again.  
“River.”  
Except that this time his voice was her in mind, stronger and nuzzling her thoughts. She could feel him there, feel his need for her, his love.  
Her need to be one with him, to bind to him, was just the same, and River moaned out his name as she shifted her weight to give him better access to her body . She tangled her legs with his, her back still to his chest, her calf draped over his.  
His hands, which were already at her waist, rose slowly to caress her, to fondle the shape of her breasts, to brush his fingers across the softness of her flesh.  
Then he entered her, reaching into her from behind. Finding the welcome he sought inside of her. This wasn’t the frenzied love making that they were sometimes inclined to, it was slow and powerful, each stroke stoking a fire of pulsating energy growing within her belly.  
River rolled her head back, not able to fully reach his mouth but brushing kisses along his cheek and jaw. The Doctor's eyes opened at last and her eyes met his. He needed her and she could see that in their depth. His eyes were filled with so much tangible love that River gasped.  
The Doctor’s hands stopped their tantalizing exploration of her body, and instead he entwined his hand with her own. River had never done this before with any of the Doctors, she looked down at their hands in wonder, as feeling coursed through each fingertip like lightning, at that moment neither of them sure which fingers were his and which were hers. Each of them clinging to the other, as one unified strength.  
As they rocked back and forth, the Doctor exquisitely thrusting in and slowly pulling out of her, all the while holding her hand, it was one of the most profound experiences of her life. How holding hands during love making could be this sexual,... this magnetic,... this personal,... she had no idea, it didn’t make sense. But they could feel their hearts beat together in their fingers, their touch was electric, permanent, and timeless.  
They both climaxed together, and then the Doctor and River, still intimately joined, still holding hands, fell back into an exhausted sleep.  
Hours later, the Doctor opened his eyes first. His throat burned and he thought his voice would be a bit raw for a while. He swallowed and River's eyelashes fluttered at the sound. Knowing she’d be fully awake any second, he picked up their still entangled hands, unlaced his thumb, and bopped her nose with it. Still asleep, she smiled, then gave a little moan and opened her eyes. She was in wonder at how well the Doctor’s color had recovered and how sharp his eyes seemed, she rolled around to face him and throw herself with relief into his arms.  
__________________ 

The Doctor sat up in bed, propped up against more pillows than he thought should even be in the Tardis.  
“River, really this is unnecessary, I’m perfectly fine except for my voice,” the Doctor protested, while River placed a tray of warm broth and soft bread in his lap.  
“Eat,” she instructed sternly.  
It was a red bisque, from something akin to a Darillium tomato she hoped. She had ordered it from Chez Alphonse and Nardole had flown it over, with a few more supplies to tide them over until the Doctor was fully recovered.  
“I did what I could Doctor, what I knew to, but I think that you’re still missing memories. Recent memories. I was connected with the Tardis, so I know some of what I helped restore, but other pieces that had been tampered with, I couldn’t access and they can still leave you vulnerable.”  
“Memories are never really lost River. Besides, It doesn’t matter,” he said trying to be encouraging, "the most important thing is, we are still here, and maybe my mind has recovered a bit more than you bargained for…”  
“Doctor?”  
He reached out for her hand, "River, River, River, why have you stayed with me? Through it all? So many lives, so many faces, I remember you now, from so many more travels, so many more adventures, so many stolen kisses. You’ve saved my life time and again."  
"As you have always done for me Doctor," River replied simply. She sat down on the edge of his bed, "as I will always do."  
He looked sadly away.  
"Please don’t", he whispered.  
River brushed her fingers through the soft waves at the crown of his head.  
"Doctor, I can feel your frown remember? Smile, stay calm.. we will face the future together."  
He started to speak and she interrupted, feeding him a spoonful of soup.  
"Shhh it’s alright, remember our promise Doctor? Always and completely.”  
It was a vow not even Memory Worms could erase.  
She gave him another mouthful of soup as he gazed up at her, eyes filled with devotion and … sad resignation.  
"Always and completely,” he repeated softly to her. 

______________________ 

The Doctor and River sat just outside the Tardis in the sandy valley, gazing up at the 27 moons of Darillium as they slowly crossed the sky. They’re so bright that they can’t see that many stars, but the Doctor has still made a habit of pointing out to River where the Milky Way is positioned in the sky, even though she doesn’t really need to be told. But it’s like a secret they share, she turns to him and smiles every time he says it. It is a sweet reminder of how far they’ve come over time and space. They’re enjoying the basket of lunch Nardole had brought over earlier. Suddenly a sharp gust of wind sweeps up a wave of sand and drops it directly into River’s hair.  
The Doctor laughs aloud.  
River shakes her hair out, very annoyed. "I’m tired of this dry weather, is this whole planet a desert?"  
“No," the Doctor said quietly, suddenly somber, "but most of this side of the planet is, and this is where we’re staying."  
"Look at what’s it’s done to my hair, Doctor! Dry heat, dry cold, sand everywhere, it is completely fried!" River said unhappily.  
"Your hair always looks like that River," he said casting a glance over nonchalantly, trying to distract her, hoping she wouldn’t ask to go anywhere else in time or space, knowing that it would put their immediate future in danger.  
Then, looking at her as she stared back with a look of complete icy exasperation at her voluminous curly mop, he sighed, "River, this is the last time I’m saying this. Your hair,... I would go to the ends of time and space for your hair. It curls out like bursts of energy from a giant sun. It is wild, like the untamed schism, your hair River, it ripples out like the Medusa Cascade, as far back as I can remember I’ve dreamt about your hair and when I take my last breath, under the stars, I swear that I will still be whispering its praises".  
River looked over sideways at him, her hooked smile bubbling into a ridiculous laugh, but then the laughter froze on her lips. She could see in his face that he was completely sincere.  
She let her hair drop down and left it alone.  
She nodded, “All right then, Doctor." And then she laid her head on his shoulder, and together they watched for the stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Look for more Doctor and River Song stories, every week! Next week: Part 3 - A Glimpse at the Rings of Darillium!


End file.
